Born in Mississippi, Louis Evans was 16 when he moved to New Orleans in 1957. He began working at Sclafani’s salad station in Metairie.

Three years later, he became Sclafani’s executive chef, the first milestone in his illustrious culinary career.
He worked at Sclafani’s for 10 years. In 1969, he became a relief chef at the Pontchartrain Hotel’s Caribbean Room. By 1972, he was the restaurant’s executive chef.
“During his 18-years of service at the Caribbean Room,” the Historic New Orleans Collection states, “Evans gained a reputation as one of the nation’s most creative, skilled Creole chefs and became the first Black chef to be admitted to the Honorable Order of the Golden Toque.”
Golden Toque means Golden Chefs Hat, according to the order’s website. “The Honorable Order is the highest acclaimed recognition a chef can receive in America.”
According to a 1990 Times-Picayune article, Evans created signature dishes at the Caribbean Room: crabmeat Biarritz, crabmeat mixed with mayonnaise and whipped cream on artichoke hearts topped with Beluga caviar; trout Eugene, a trout filet covered with crabmeat and sauteed shrimp; oyster chowder; and Crawfish Evans, a crawfish and pasta dish.
His red beans and rice, lemon ice box pie, and breaded pork, turnip greens and candied sweet potato po boy also were acclaimed.
“He had a natural feel for Creole food,” Pontchartrain’s former owner Albert Aschaffenburg told the newspaper. “Like most of our great Creole cooks, he learned it at his mother’s knee . . . and he instinctively knew how to put it together.”
Evans honed his skills at Delgado Community College and the Culinary Institute of America in New York. In 1987, he became the chef at Kabby’s in the New Orleans Hilton.
He completed “Louis Evans’ Creole Cookbook,” shortly before cancer took his life in December 1990. He was 49.
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